Thursday, September 09, 2010

What Bugs Me About AC/DC

When I was in fifth grade (1980-81), I loved AC/DC. My dad owned Back in Black and Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap but I listened to them more than he did (though he tried to keep me from hearing certain "adult lyrics"). My first big thrill as a record collector was finding the Australian import of Dirty Deeds, which included my favorite AC/DC song, "Jailbreak" (not on any U.S. releases at the time, but radio stations played it a lot). It was in the Sears record department at the local mall, of all places! [The import's cover features the tattooed forearm shown below, although Amazon's tracklist is for the American version.]

I didn't stay "into" AC/DC for long, though. By the time For Those About to Rock We Salute You came out, I wasn't interested enough to buy it. A lack of radio play compared to Back in Black was probably part of it, but I think I just moved on to other bands.

Fast forward 25 years. I became a hardcore collector of bootleg concert recordings for several years (I quit cold turkey last spring). My brother, a toddler when Back in Black came out, is much more into AC/DC than I've been since fifth grade, so I downloaded many concerts for him. And this is what bugs me about AC/DC: "For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)" is one of the greatest concert openers ever written, but the band closes with that song! Why would you play for 90 minutes and then sing a song called "For Those About to Rock"? I haven't been able to find a good explanation. My best guess is that they made it the encore because they used a cannon, and they figured they couldn't beat that for a climax.